Hello Darling Ones,

Last night, kind of spur of the moment, the Black Sheep (my writing group) had a little zoom call to catch up on what’s-a-goin’-on in these unprecedented times. It’s been months since we last caught up with each other. I’m not kidding you when I say seeing all their faces made me want to cry with happiness. Aside from BFK, who after 20+ years and who talks to my mom more than I do, is like family, I have no seen a non-family person since I don’t know, maybe April? May? Does time mean anything anymore?

If you don’t follow me on Twitter (why don’t you follow me on twitter? I’m a goddamn delight!) Here’s the notes from the meeting.

My Writing Group: I’m finishing a draft of a novel! I’ve just finished writing a chapter book! I write and draw every day! My picture book is coming out next year!
Me: I lay on the couch staring up at a dirty ceiling fan for hours & then I watch TikTok.

— Jodi Chromey (@jodiwilldare) October 7, 2020

They are amazing, creative, kind, supportive, encouraging people, and I’m the trash goblin they occasionally let hang out with them.

Darling Ones, today I did not stare at that dirty ceiling fan for hours. I DID NOT!

I only stared at it for about 45 minutes, because I did not manage to make it out of bed and downstairs until nearly 10 a.m. (for the first time in ages I fell asleep after the 4:45 a.m. bathroom break and the 7:45-8:15 lawn mowing where I wish murder upon the people mowing and blowing and doing stuff that is way too loud for that time in the morning).

Anyway, the sight of the dirty, dripping with dust caterpillars ceiling fan was driving me bananas. So many bananas that I put down the TikTok (I’ve fallen into tattooed, bearded, dad-bods who love fatties thirst trap TikTok, so you know this wasn’t easy), went into the garage, hauled the super crusty and annoying apparatus I need to clean the 20-foot high ceiling fan, and I cleaned it.

It sucked. A bunch. Because of gravity those stupid dust caterpillars have nowhere to go but down and so by the time I have dusted the ceiling fan it looks like a light grey blizzard has hit my living room. So then you have to vacuum and dust and do all that other kind of housekeeping bullshit I really hate doing.

But I did it. And now when I tell people that I lay on the couch watching the ceiling fan it feels 38% less depressing. Right?

I knew you’d agree with me.

Jodi

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Second of all, I started most of these habits back over Thanksgiving weekend when I got the new couch. Did I tell you about the new couch? It is brown and very couchlike. I got a new couch because I was tired of the short blue couch. I told you this, didn’t I? I’m too lazy to go look so just act like this is brand new information.

So when I got the new brown couch I had to clean the crap out of my house. It was genius planning on my part because the new brown couch was delivered on the Friday after Thanksgiving which was the day before I was to host Rock & Roll Bookclub. It was like getting a two-for-one on my cleaning efforts.

Let me tell you something. I hate cleaning. I hate cleaning and I hate organizing and I hate all the things that go with cleaning and/or organizing. It’s boring and it’s dirty. I’ve often joked that my house is so full of dust and cat hair that it’s as though I live in soft focus. Only that wasn’t a joke because it is the truth!

Or it was the truth because I’ve been like super clean since that Friday after Thanksgiving. Super clean here is relative. I’m not gonna win any kind of homemaker awards from Betty Crocker or Mr. Clean or anything like that. But if you were to come over right this second as I type. Well, I’d be a little freaked out because dude, you don’t drop over unannounced, but I wouldn’t have to die of embarrassment at the squalid conditions of my living quarters. Oh, and also this only applies to the downstairs ‘public’ areas. If you went upstairs I’d have to kill, or you’d just die of your own free will because it’s dusty as shit up there and it’s like an abandoned bra/sweater jungle. Those suckers are hanging all over the place up there. Which is still, you know, an improvement because the downstairs used to the bra/sweater jungle. Now I’ve learned to put my shit away. Though there is a hoodie and a scarf hanging off the bannister down here, because I am human after all.

The other thing I’ve begun to do. . . the dishes! I know, I know you’re like “Welcome to grownuphood, Chucklehead, enjoy the stay.” But as I’ve mentioned 827,041 times I’m single & I live alone which means that nobody ever knows how awful I am. Ever. I’ve, essentially, lived in a state of college-like squalor for the last twenty years. It was time for something new, and since I’ve done the unrepentant slob thing I thought I’d try the endearingly messy grownup thing. Look at this old dog learning new tricks.

Also, I got a sexy persimmon-colored Kitchen-Aid Mixer for Christmas which I plan to take out of the box any day now and that totally deserves a clean kitchen. Right?

The post New Habits I’m Developing, which started in November so they’re not really resolutions appeared first on I Will Dare.

I had to dust that fucker today and it sucked. When you pair my fear of heights with the fact that even standing and looking straight up at something really high makes me a bit woozy, you can see this is a recipe for something that’s not gonna taste very good.

Why the hell am I even dusting that thing, you might ask. Good question. Once again I am playing host to all my mom’s brothers and sisters and their children and their children’s children on Christmas Eve. So I have to spiff up the Supergenius HQ. This is serious spiffing too. It’s not like my sisters are coming kind of clean where I just have to straighten the piles of crap and defur the couch. It’s not even like Rock & Roll Bookclub cleaning where I have to sweep floors and clean toilets. No, this is old Minnesota Aunt Cleaning — the worst kind of cleaning of all.

Matters are not helped at all by the fact that Supergenius HQ looks a bit like a college frat house circa 1997 — bras on the banister, pizza boxes, and in your mental picture where you’ve placed empty beer cans replace those with books. I’m slovenly and sue me. I’m done making apologies for it. I wish I had been born with that strand of DNA that makes me kind of a clean freak, but I wasn’t. Besides, my time is much better spent listening to podcasts of The New Yorker and playing Bejeweled than dusting base boards.

So I dusted the ceiling fan and it sucked. Did I already say that? I have a special telescoping pole thing with various attachments for dust removal, and it still sucks.

However, if you’re the Tibbles you believe I dust the fan flying up there with a feather duster after strapping on a pair of magic wings made out of lightning and fire that cannot be seen by the eyes of children until they are fourteen.

So for Christmas I would like some magic wings made out of lightning and fire and I promise that I’ll dust that fucker every week.

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As someone who is surrounded by books, I was struck by the thought. I love my books and display them prominently in my home. But the idea of the books that I love having a special energy really got to me. I just love that idea. It got me thinking that it’s time to do a purge. As you can see by the picture of the current state of my main bookcase, it is time to do some cleaning too.

I’m a little afraid because I have a hard time with purging books. But I have to. I’m starting to be that cat lady with pathways carved into the stacks of book in her house -one path to the bathroom, one path to the bedroom, and one path to the door. So sad. I don’t know if I’ll have the strength to oust Kerouac and I already know I can’t break up a collection (sure Irving’s Son of the Circus blew goats, but I just can’t).

In my head I am making up and revising rules for this purge before I even begin. I can keep it if it came from someone I love. I can keep it if I bought it on a Tuesday in July and the sun was shining bright. I can keep it if. . .

I’m a hoarder. It’s awful. There are books on that shelf that haven’t ever even been read. Books I’ve owned for years and years and years and never even lifted the cover. I don’t need those. I don’t.

My goal, I am stating it right here out loud on the Internet where everything happens and is true, is to put 25 books into the giveaway/donate box. I have a week until I host Rock & Roll bookclub and I can always take something out. Right?

The post On book collecting & what is probably a mental illness appeared first on I Will Dare.

However, I am pleased to report that I have a small laundry basket filled with books to give away. I have axed Nick Hornby and Richard Ford from the collection (the former for sucking and the latter for not beguiling me to ever pick it up and read it since I got it 1996). I feel a little odd for dismissing two of Hornby’s novels when I kept High Fidelity. It feels wrong somehow. Jonathan Lethem has not suffered the same fate though he should, because that last book sucked.

And then there’s Jack Kerouac. On the Road is the most overrated piece of bullshit literary critics have foisted on the reading public. And yet, I cannot seem to purge it from my collection. I have no idea why, but even the thought of getting rid of it seemed wrong.

Getting rid of Nell Freudenberger’s short story collection Lucky Girls also seems wrong. I cannot explain this one either. I did not enjoy the collection. In fact, I disliked it so much that when one of her stories is assigned in a writing class I skip it because I know I didn’t like it and why waste my time? And yet, there she is on the shelf between Gina Frangello and Joshua Furst.

Someone ought to come up with some hard fast rules when it comes to keeping or purging books.

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